The Lower Macungie Township pool, closed Wednesday night and all day Thursday after a youngster with diarrhea tainted it, might reopen today. The situation caused alarm in light of an E. coli outbreak at an Atlanta water park that originated from a similar incident.

Township officials are awaiting test results from Town and Country Labs in Allentown, which is analyzing a sample of the water for coliform bacteria, found in the intestines of humans. If the tests for the bacteria are negative, the pool will reopen today.

Public Works Coordinator Marge Szulborski said the township took extra precautions by testing the water immediately and closing the pool until the results come through. Ten children were infected with E. coli from swallowing water contaminated by a child with diarrhea two weeks ago in Marietta, Ga., a suburb of Atlanta.

Szulborski said the incident occurred around 5:30 p.m. and was reported by a parent and lifeguard who witnessed the mishap at the shallow end of the larger pool. The pool, which is usually closed at 7 p.m., was shut down immediately and treated with heavy doses of chlorine. The water is usually safe after it has been "shocked" three times, Szulborski said.

Officials said they do not know how many people were at the pool when it was evacuated, but no one has reported being ill. To Szulborski's knowledge, this is the first time an incident like this has happened there. The public pool is behind the township building on Brookside Road.

The pool usually attracts up to 600 people on hot days like Thursday. All swim lessons and meets were canceled and residents looking to escape from the sweltering heat were met with a "Closed" sign posted at the entrance.

"It was kind of a hardship for us, but I understood that they had to do what they had to do," said Lucille Stoss, a parent volunteer for the township swim team. Stoss and other parents had to notify all 118 swimmers about the closing and were forced to reschedule their swim meet against Palmerton.

State law requires most pools to undergo weekly bacteria tests and quarterly drinking water tests. Lynn Kuka, a lab director at Town and Country Labs, said it is unusual for coliform bacteria to grow in swimming pools because the chlorine usually kills it.

"But chlorine in pool water can only take so much," Kuka said.

E. coli is one type of coliform bacteria that lives in the digestive tracts of humans and warm-blooded animals. The strain affecting the children in Atlanta is highly toxic and causes bloody diarrhea and severe cramps. One expert at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said this is the first known case in the nation where people in a chlorinated public pool were infected with E. coli.

Officials at Dorney Park and Wildwater Kingdom said they are always operating with a heightened sense of precaution, even when people aren't aware of it.

"It could happen to any park, unfortunately," said spokesman Mark Sosnowsky. "But we take all steps to prevent it."

This includes requiring toddlers in diapers to wear a protective layer over the diaper and designating an area away from the water for parents to change their children. The park also conducts four to five manual chemical tests daily on all of its 13 water attractions.

If a child defecates in the water, Sosnowsky said officials remove it from the pool immediately and flush the contaminated water. But the water is not immediately tested.

"When you have an area as large as the wave pool, the E. coli couldn't go through the whole water," he said. "It would be impossible to test every ounce of water in the pool."

Last year the Allentown Health Bureau closed two pools with high coliform counts. Anything over zero is considered high, said Tom Morgan, associate director for environmental health services. Morgan said the city Health Bureau has not issued any advisories at its pools this season.